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DUH!! They need a permit? MAL leased the boat to Phillips on January 27, 2009. The boat arrived in Chattanooga on February 10 ?. Now more than 60 days later the need for a COE/TVA permit, come on and get real. Maybe the boat is not in as good of hands as thought. If you operate in the river business the permit process is a no brainer. Maybe we should all look back to Capt. Joe Baers thread on January 31, 2009 as to an in depth look at the many permits required. That grand opening looks pretty far off.

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Right now we are consulting with the National Trust for Historic Preservation and their attorneys to see what is the best tact to take in writing our comments. The comments must be mailed via USPS, not email. When we have heard back from the National Trust, then we will have letter-writing campaign. This must be done right, so the attorneys are checking all the ins and outs of this, and it may take until the end of the week. However, we will still have time to take action, since the deadline is not until May 4. We all want what is best for the Queen, especially that she maintain her integrity and ability to travel.

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I read the TVA stuff at work, my work computer allowed the PDF download, my home Mac computer did not...whatever, the end result is a comment in this report about "all utilities are in place" or something close to that statement...

Cut me a break... I saw nothing addressing sewage, domestic water, fire protection or electrical services. Which is exactly what my concerns were mentioned here last month...let alone how they are going to deliver #2 fuel oil with all those rigid arm supports in place. Memo to the fuel oil delivery company: Bring an extra long hose...Memo to the honey dipper: Bring an extra long hose...

According to what I've heard the sewage system on the DQ is still utilizing a semi-holding tank and that will be a real problem after about the second day of overnighters...but as my very recently introduced friend usually says "what do I know?"

I'm sorry, I'm not a fan of this endeavor, and I thinking rose colored glasses are what is driving this activity. They need to do their homework and they haven't...

Anybody want to hazard a guess how they are heating domestic hot water without the boilers running? Could also be an issue next fall when the old gal needs heat in the staterooms and lounges...

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let's please differenciate and not use any occasion to offload your grief over the whole situation while - like here - it doesn't have to do much with the whole situation.

This permit only is about Army Corps of Engineers requirements, i. e. the mooring needs to be done right and according to Corps rules.

There are for sure many other permits neeeded to operate the DQ as a hotel, but that's not the Corps' business, so it's not part of this permit.

Please, just don't forget: Mr. Phillips at this time is the only one who takes care of the Delta Queen at all. From good sources I do know (and for the MQ we all know) what happens to the other boats when Ambassadors is the "caretaker" - they don't even install dehumidifiers to keep the interior intact. There is no investor around who actually HAS the CASH to buy the DQ; the ones we've seen only claim they want to buy the DQ and are disappointed when Ambassadors turns them down because they're looking for a long-term financing which doesn't seem to be an option for AMIE, probably due to their own difficult financial situation.

Anyway, I'm just asking for remembering what our goal is and what realistically is possible at this time. I haven't given up the Dqleta Queen. Not at all. But we need to stay realistic and give everything a friendly chance that has the potential to keep the Delta Queen alive, one or the other way.

And now you can flame me for this way of thinking ;-)

Franz

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Franz, it's not grief...I have a problem with people that are incapable or unwilling to fully identify all the potential concerns to this endeavor as well as thinking up acceptable solutions for these concerns. I have heard that advice has been offered and ignored only to have a problem develop later, sound familiar? I have heard that employees have been ordered to start staying on board yet they had to leave after one night due to lack of hot water. I find this shallowness of thinking disturbing when it is directed at something that is 82 years old, and is so dear to my heart.

The above was, in a way, very similar to the reasons I had such a huge issue with what was posted a while back, about why the boats have "failed". Parlour talking drives me crazy. If people don't have all the answers, they ought to be talking to the experts instead of blindly winging it, rapidly, quickly offering SWAG's because they think that others will see them as stupid if they were to instead simply admit "I don't know..."...

Now what does this have to do with the ACOE and TVA requirements? Beats me, but I'm sitting here wondering if either of those two establishments are concernerd about the sewage the boat will be creating and what will happen to that sewage...has this problem been thought through? I have heard about the issues the floating casinos have with this very thing, and I'm hoping somebody has taken the time to figure out how to handle this little inconvenience on the DQ.

I'm not about to sit here and say I totally know how the boat "works", however I have a pretty good idea...and there are fundamental, basic infrastructure on the boat that does not work while the boat is stationary without extensive modification. There are also boat systems, very basic and quite necessary systems that rely on steam to work...There are also land based utilities that may not work well with a floating hotel, either due to available capacity or specific operational parameters of the city's utilities. Yes, I have my concerns, but my rants are not whining, I just strongly want for somebody, hopefully Capt. Phillips, to take notice, because it appears to me 800 miles away that important stuff is falling through the cracks.

I sincerly want Capt. Phillips to succeed, it may be difficult for anybody to gather that from my writings. I hope the best for him, as I've stated in the past, he is the currator now. Godspeed...

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Let me first say that I am no expert. However, I have tried to do my homework regarding this issue after receiving numerous phone calls and emails. First of all, I called the Corp office and asked for more information. My computer would not let me open the attachment. They kindly emailed me the Public Notice along with the drawings submitted by Miller-McCoy, Inc. Consulting Engineers. I'm no engineer, but I have read plans and specs for home building for more years than I want anyone to know. They didn't appear intrusion to me. So I called Miller-McCoy Consulting Engineers this morning. The kind gentleman I spoke with said steel plates will be welded to the side of the DELTA QUEEN with rings on them and these will be attached to the rigid poles that will connect on shore to deadmen anchorages or something of the sort. These will be flexible in that they will allow the boat to move up and down depending on the level of the river. I just now received a message from Mr. Hernandez at the Corp whom our comments are to be directed. His message said that nothing will be disturbed on the boat. No machinery will be removed. As a matter of fact he said that it was the wish that once the exemption was granted that she would be able to travel again as before. What better comment could we have gotten!?!?!

I know it's easy to jump to conclusions when it's our dear and loved boat involved. But sometimes we have to take a deep breath and review everything involved here. Now I have no idea how connections are being made to shore facilities as in the items that Bruno mentions. It does appear that the City of Chattanooga is looking upon this venture as an asset to their city and are doing everything to make it happen and for it to work.

WE ALL agree this is not our first choice. That would have been for Oberstar to have let the exemption on the Coast Guard Reauthorization Bill and business as usual. However, considering the fade of other assets of AMIE (as a fellow steamboater has reminded me) - at least she appears to be being cared for. Having met Captain Phillips I sincerely believe he has good intentions. My comment in a private email to one concerned was that yes, he may make mistakes. But hopefully they will be small mistakes and he'll learn from them. I have also met some of his partners in this venture. They are well educated men, who also are rivermen. Granted not steamboat men. But at least they are not the corporate or bluewater type that we have been dealing with.

At last but not least, we do have former crew on board - who love our boat as much as we do and will certainly speak up if they see something amiss. And to top it off, if all permits are granted hopefully sooner than later any of us can be on board to see for ourselves that all is well.

What more can we ask for at this point?!?!?

Bottom line, let's try to stay cool and reasonable. We need a sympathetic owner for her. Who might that be? Who knows. I keep hearing different things along this line. As one of our beloved Captain's says "keep the faith".

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Bruno, what I'm saying simply is: This permit we're discussing in this thread is not meant to solve the sewage problem. It's like asking your doctor to address problems with your car. I'm just asking to not mix up things that don't have anything to do with each other. Otherwise we're in this terrible type of discussion where rumors, assumptions and worse are being mixed up and being presented as facts. This doesn't help our cause it just helps some of us to vent their minds in the public. We had that discussion before and I'm tired of seeing this starting again and again.

All the other things I wanted to say are very well summed up in Jo Ann's posting already, so I don't have to repeat that. Thanks, Jo Ann, I fully agree :-)

Franz

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OK, maybe I'm mistaken, but I'm thinking the TVA is VERY concerned about sewage in its waterways. I also suspect, but I do not know for sure, that the Port of Chattanooga is not going to allow the Delta Queen Hotel to dispose of its sewage the same way the Delta Queen Steamboat did. And yes, I'm aware that the Port of Chattanooga is not part of this permit process, the point of my post wasn't limited to ACOE/TVA concerns. Presently, unless she has already been modified with the addition of a BIG duplex sewage ejector, the Delta Queen cannot send it's sewage directly to Chattanooga's treatment plants.

If utilities weren't important to this permit process then they wouldn't have been mentioned in the application. My point, as I did state earlier as nice as I could, was to try to make anybody aware that... there appear to be potential problems that haven't been thought out, utilities being just one of those problems. And until the problems are resolved, the boatel will be hard pressed to succeed.

I guess I have a poor way of expressing myself...

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Bruno, that's exactly what I mean: What's your source for this information, that there are problems not being taken care of? What makes you so sure that Mr. Phillips didn't think about all this? Doesn't the actual permit request indicate that he in fact is taking care of such issues? Did you ask Mr. Phillips about it? Do you have any reliable sources that tell you that it is so? Or is it just an assumption because you don't like the project and therefore imply everything negative that might possible be there?

Again, I'm asking everyone to rely in facts, not assumptions based on not much more than a negative gut feeling ...

Franz

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I have always been 100 percent FOR this project, somehow you didn't quite get that? Yes, I ain't stupid, I get that Chattanooga care is a lot better than NOLA, I don't need a sledgehammer over the head to get that tidbit.

I have been told over my career that what I mean to say, what I truly feel, is NOT what comes outa my mouth. For that I appologize. Deb gets it, but she's had 39 years to figure it out. You need to bear with me.

Do you think I'm stupid enough to make stuff up to post on this perpetual information machine, the internet? pluheaseee...this forum, YOU Franz, have taught me that we all need to be careful, I'd like to believe I got that one rule, as I believe I'm semi-intelligent. Actually this forum has taught me a lot.

Yes I have sources, from multiple directions. What the sources are, are immaterial, and I have a problem with you asking. Where did I get the information? All that does is get us into a we vs. them secenerio, and these are my friends, your friends providing the information...Though I will tell you that the very silly issue of no hot water after Bill and Laura spent a night was on the internet, for all to find...the sewage, hot water, power, fire protection and fire detection issues are huge issues when switching over to a stationary building site, and is a part of what makes my career, my career, these are questions at the forefront of my job, what I have done for a living for the past 32 years...this is why I'm a professional engineer in 5 states.

I also sorta understand how the Delta Queen works, not sure there are people in this thread other than Judy, Capt Sanders and Capt Judd that understand the idiosycracies of the Legendary One. There are also a slew of others that know that shall remain nameless, but have given me their profound wisdom.

Deb and I adore this old boat and quite frankly I think we have lost her. Thank Gawd we were so nice to Majestic, how did that work for the steamboater in all of us? I'm the good guy here, why am I seen as a jerk?

I hope all of you are correct, you, Bill McCready, everybody. I will buy everybody at least one round of drinks in the Texas and allow you to poke me in the chest over and over and say nyah, nyah, nyah you were WRONG Bruno...How cool would that be? Damn, I have my fingers crossed, nobody would be happier...

Good luck everybody, we'll see you around...

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I just repeat myself over and over again for almost years now that I think it's the absolutely wrong way to bring up and discuss all these negative thoughts at length in the public. period. I will not change my mind about this.

Negativism doesn't help. Positive thinking, support, making friends, looking for opportunities, make new connections to influencial people will help. Bashing everyone who dares to have a closer look at "our" Delta Queen makes even more enemies instead of building a network of support.